Max Flinton and the Cursed Crown
by DaughterOfPoseidon111
Summary: When a strange demigod appears at Camp Half-Blood, he is welcomed warmly. But then a wave of monsters attacks the camp, he finds a magic sword, and who gets the blame? Now he has to go on an epic quest to stop the monsters.
1. I Read People's Minds

_Max Flinton and the Cursed Crown_

_1. I Read People's Minds_

I couldn't help feeling embarassed when Chiron told me to come forward in front of the whole camp. Nope, I don't have stage-fright, but standing up in front of at least a hundred demigods is a freakish experience. "This is Max Flinton," Chiron announced. "We have not yet discovered his godly parent, so he will be staying with the Hermes cabin." The whole camp alternately cheered/groaned, and I felt my face go bright scarlet. One guy was cheering more enthusiastically than all the others, a teenager with dark hair and sea-green eyes. There was a girl with blonde hair and grey eyes sitting next to him, and I figured it out straight away, I thought: _She's his girlfriend_. I noticed that they both had identical streaks of grey in their hair, because the silvery colour was catching the light from the campfire, which was six feet tall, glowing a brilliant green. "Annabeth and Percy," Chiron continued. "I want you to keep an eye on him." The demigods I'd been looking at nodded, and I felt myself blushing again. I just hoped they hadn't seen me staring at them. Eventually the campers dispersed, and they came up to me. The guy with green eyes was grinning happily. I got the feeling he was generally in a good mood lately. The girl, Annabeth, was studying me critically, as if she was figuring where she should stab me. That made me feel kind of angry for some reason. Apparently she decided to dismiss me as a threat to her, or possibly her _boyfriend_, because she smiled in a friendly way. "Well, you probably know now, but I'm Annabeth," she said cheerfully. "I'm Percy," the guy said politely, but he seemed to be thinking of something else, his eyes had that glazed look I get when I'm in school. Annabeth nudged him with her elbow, giving him an irritated look. "Oh, yeah, I'm Percy," he repeated, looking embarassed. "Welcome to Camp Half-Blood." Then his face went sort of dreamy again, like his brain was drifting. "Seaweed Brain..." Annabeth muttered, and I could tell I wasn't the only one who'd noticed his lack of concentration. I waited a sec, pretty sure this wasn't the time, but then I had to ask. "So... you're his girlfriend?" I inquired innocently. Percy snapped back to earth like a dog on a leash. "Um... yeah," Annabeth said, blushing furiously. I studied Percy for a moment to let the mushy stuff pass by. He had sea-green eyes, just like my own, and dark hair with that grey streak. I'd heard a lot about him, especially how he'd defeated Kronos just a few weeks ago, and how before that he'd held up the sky. He didn't look particularly special, but I knew he was literally invincible. "Uh-huh... Well, are you going to show me around, or do I need to call on an Aphrodite kid to snap you out of it?" I asked mischeiviously, grinning when I saw both faces go a darker shade of the Camp Half-Blood T-shirt. "Um... yeah," Annabeth mumbled, gesturing for me to follow her. "So... How long you been together?" I asked, abandoning all attempts to keep my curiosity under control. _I could get used to this_, I thought happily, when I saw Annabeth's face. "Five weeks," she muttered, giving me a glare. If looks could kill, I'd probably be some sort of super-concentrated ghost by now. Hades would have to build a special section of the Underworld for people who died from Annabeth's killing glares. Seriously, that girl's got eyes like Medusa. Anyway, after she'd finished doing the angry-demigod thing, she was pretty nice. Then... "I'm going to take you to meet Lyra Castellan. She's the new head of the Hermes cabin after Luke died... She's Luke's cousin." Annabeth's face tightened. "You don't trust her, do you?" I said. Suddenly I clapped my hand over my face, amazed I'd just said that. _Di immortales_, I hadn't even thought about it before my stupid mouth ran again. "Gods, Annabeth, I'm so sorry," I said desperately. Her face was unreadable for a second, then... "It's okay," she said wearily. "You know, you could be one of Dionysus' kids. They're generally really good at reading expressions." I nodded meekly, disgusted with myself. Anyway, she took me to see Lyra Castellan. She wasn't at all like I expected. "Hi, I'm Lyra.," she said. I nearly choked.


	2. I Meet Bronze Beef

_2. I Meet Bronze Beef_

She was _cute_, and I'm not laying it on thick. She had these elfish features, piercing blue eyes, and short blonde hair. She was fit and muscular, with tanned skin. Seriously, I was thinking her mom was the goddess of good-looking girls or something. "I'm Max," I replied stupidly. If she noticed anything odd about the fact that I was practically drooling over her, she chose to ignore it. "Nice to meet ya." Her smile reached her sky-blue eyes. I practically had a coronary, but one of the _good_ ones. I think she figured it out after a minute, cause right in the middle of the tour, she suddenly blushed for no reason. Obviously, that made me blush too, and we got a couple of wolf-whistles from the campers. Honestly, I wasn't too bothered about that, it was what happened next that totally ticked me off. Apparently, the arrival of a new demigod had made the lookouts a little lazy, because next thing I knew, I was run over by a huge bull. I know, crazy right? Bulls are generally frightening, but this was something else. When you meet a bull that's a good 8 feet tall, made of hard unyielding metal, glaring at you with furnace eyes, and belching 4-metre flames, _then_ you start to wonder if you've had too much nectar. "Colchis bulls!" Lyra yelled, immediately gathering some half-bloods to take 'em down. _Grace under pressure_, I thought, in the part of my brain that wasn't currently being squashed by an elephant-grade weight of bronze. Groaning, I tried to push the stupid automaton off me, but there was no way I could lift the thing. I swear, I wouldn't be surprised if I heard something crack under _that_ much bull. Then I noticed something, gleaming on the grass beside me. I didn't guess what it was, I just thought it looked pretty sharp, so I grabbed it and stabbed it into the clockwork gears on the bull's chest. That made it stand to attention, then its ruby eyes dimmed, and it started mooing the American anthem. Where does a bronze bull pick up stuff like that, anyway? I rolled out from underneath it, keeping a firm grip on the pointed object I'd picked up. Only now did I realize that it was a _sword_, about 4 feet of deadly celestial bronze, with a golden hilt and glowing runes along the blade. I was amazed it hadn't broken under the gears' motion. I touched the flat of the sword and felt burning heat spread up my arm, moving along to my ribs, dulling the pain. Instinctively, I plunged it into the singing bull's forehead, so its eyes went black, the gears stopped and it collapsed. I then noticed a silver rune on the hilt of my new weapon. There was a smudge of dirt on it, so I absent-mindedly rubbed it off, but then the sword shrank and turned into a titanium watch. The hands on the watch face were thin gold threads, ceaselessly swaying back and forth to the tiny silver runes that served as numbers. "Cool..." I breathed, amazed that such a huge weapon could turn into such a delicate thing. Anyway, I then had to dodge the inferno coming from a Colchis bull, which had sneaked up behind me. I rubbed the watch face, and it flipped in the air, turning back into a sword. While the bull was startled, I leapt forwards and lopped off its left horn. This made it go totally off balance, wheeling around on two legs on its side, as if it was aspiring to be an acrobat. Then I slashed at its back, cutting a deep gouge in the metal, so the bull fell at my feet like its brother. I took a moment to look around, but what I saw wasn't pretty. Three demigods were taking on the alpha bull, a huge 12-foot guy, with a blackened hide from the smoke bursting from its mouth. I jumped in to help them, but the alpha charged at me, sending me flying, a deep cut in my shoulder (Thank you, bull horns.) That made _me_ seriously angry. Stupid bull, shoving in right when I meet this girl... That did it. I jumped on to the alpha's back, clutching its golden horns, doing my best not be thrown to Alaska. I took my sword, balanced it in my hand, and rammed it into the back of the alpha's neck. It kept struggling for a minute, but eventually it quietened down, and I'm pretty sure it's stayed tame ever since. Lyra came running up. "Max, that was amazing! You haven't even got a sword..." Then she noticed the runic blade in my hand. "Who gave that to you?" she asked curiously. "I picked it up, it was just lying there..." I pointed to the spot where the first Colchis bull was dissolving into dust. We went back, but there was no hint of anything there, except for a small silver rune carved into the earth. "Wasn't me," I said straight away. "I've seen too many 'Keep Off The Grass' signs." She smiled, and I think my heart skipped a minute's worth of beats.


	3. I Receive A Quest

_3. I Receive A Quest_

Later on, Chiron held a meeting by the campfire, to talk about how the bulls had infiltrated camp, with the Golden Fleece still there, and why the strange sword had appeared. By general agreement, I was allowed to keep it; everyone said that it came to me, so I was its rightful owner. Suddenly, one of the demigods, I think from Ares' cabin, shouted: "How do you know that Lyra didn't let them in? Her cousin was a traitor!" I flushed angrily, opened my mouth to yell something equally accusing back at him, but Chiron gave me a warning look. I also noticed Annabeth and Percy looking just as furious. "There is no question of her loyalty. Otherwise, why would she fight so hard against them today?" The Ares kid kept muttering under his breath, but he knew he was beaten; there was no arguing against a reply as righteous as that. "Ahem... The Olympians have decided to begin a quest, partly to find what enabled the bulls to enter camp, partly to investigate the appearance of Max's sword," I went slightly red as all the eyes in the firelight came to rest on my watch, which was strapped firmly around my right wrist. After some mental warring, I'd decided to call it _Archaios_, which apparently meant Ancient in Greek; at least, Annabeth told me. According to her, the sword was very old, five hundred years at least, and probably from actual Greece, but what really excited her was that the blade wasn't made of celestial bronze at all. She said she'd never seen anything like it before, which made me sort of proud. She'd then gone over to the Hephaestus cabin, got a heavy drill and worked on it, and then declared that it was indestructible. Having so many people looking at such a valuable object did _not_ make me feel any better. "As you all know, the winter solstice occured today, and the gods have made their decision for the demigods that will go on this quest. This is the list of demigods... Ahem." He dramatically cleared his thorat, took a piece of paper from some kind of outdoorsy desktop, and read it out, name by name. "Max Flinton, you have been chosen to go on this quest," he announced. I went numb with shock as I was led up to where Chiron stood. A few people patted me on the back, which was nice I guess, but I was too surprised to really register it. It was all I could do to contain my excitement as the next demigod was read out. "Lyra Castellan." Some Ares guys swapped dark looks and there was a suspicious amount of whispering, but Lyra's friends, and myself, cheered so loudly it drowned out the sound. _Perfect_, I thought. "Annabeth Chase." She looked pretty shocked too, but she managed to look dignified. And finally... "Percy Jackson." Whoa... There were so many whispers, it sounded like the leaves were having a rustling match...* Anyway, either Percy had bad hearing, or he was used to being whispered about, because he totally ignored it. I was happy to have them along, though, at least I would _know_ the people I was on a quest with. Annabeth seemed pretty glad too, and I can guess why. I noticed that Percy was tossing a silver ballpoint pen around, but I figured it out. Duh... My sword can change into a watch, his can change into a ballpoint pen... Perfectly normal. Yeah, so we got kicked out of camp, shoved out into random wilderness... And before I knew it, I was on a quest.

* This is a bad joke!


	4. I Meet The God Of The Sea

_4. I Meet The God Of The Sea_

So, let me get this straight. I was tossed out of the only place I'd known since... Friday, thrown into the mad world of mortals, with only a super-smart daughter of Athena, an awesome invincible son of Poseidon, and a cute girl, daughter of Hermes. Scary, huh? Not for me. I didn't even know who my godly parent was yet, something which I was freaking out over, and, well... I just felt a _tiny_ little bit... Left out. There, I said it. I'm surrounded by extremely powerful demigods, and I'm this new kid who doesn't even know if he _is_ a demigod. Speaking of which... Suddenly everyone was staring at something over my head. "What?" I said. "Has a pigeon landed on me or something?" I looked up. There was a floating holographic image above my head, so it looked like someone had taped the world's largest glowstick to my head. The image was weird, like it was trying to be two things at once; it was constantly morphing between forms. One form was a silver owl, the other was a sea-green three-pronged fork, the head of a trident. "Now I'm confused..." Annabeth muttered. Eveyone instantly turned to her for advice. "What, you think I know everything?" She demanded. "Yep," everyone replied in unison. She sighed. "Truth is, I have no idea, I've never even heard of anything like this. The only explanation I can think of is that you're one of Poseidon's kids, because that image was stronger, and you've been blessed by Athena. Which is impossible, because she hates his guts." Everyone fell silent. "I have an idea," said Percy.

"No you don't," Annabeth retorted.

"Yes I do."

"No you don't."

"Why not?"

"Because your ideas are stupid."

"Are not!"

"Are too." There was silence again. Annabeth sighed. "What's your idea, Seaweed Brain?" Percy thought for a sec.

"We could just ask my- I mean _our_ dad." We all considered this. "That's a good idea," Lyra suddenly said, and I realised she hadn't talked for a while. "If Max really is Poseidon's son, he can't just lie to

him," she reasoned.

"You sure you're not Athena's?" I asked innocently, which made her blush. Annabeth saved her the torture of answering. "We need to find a lake, or a river, something like that." Percy nodded, and closed his eyes. I swear I heard running water. "There's a creek nearby," he said, eyes still shut. "If I can just find it..." His face scrunched up with concentration. His eyes opened and he smiled. "Really nearby, just through there." He pointed to a sort of mini-cliff just to the right. There was a thin trickle of water dripping down one side. "I-I need to talk to him," I said nervously. To my amazement, Percy nodded understandingly. "Just put your hand under the water and focus, you'll know what to do." I seriously doubted it. Still, I pressed my left hand against the cold slippery stone and closed my eyes. Instantly, I felt like a Colchis bull had been lifted off my shoulders, and those things are heavy, believe me. I focused hard, all I could see were dark ripples through my vision, as if was looking at fish in a black lake. But then I saw this guy, about thirty-five years old, in a Hawaii fisherman outfit, reeling in the shadowy fish. He was humming softly to himself, but then he looked up and his face went white.

"M-Max?" He stammered disbelievingly. I didn't think a god could stammer, but he managed. "Yes... Are you Poseidon?" I asked, trying to hide my nervousness. Suddenly his face creased into a huge grin. "You're... you're alive?" I couldn't help but smile.

"Yeah, I think so... Although, this doesn't exactly look like the land of the living." He grinned even wider, he looked ridiculously happy, and I saw that he had sea-green eyes like me and Percy. "But... Athena killed you." That was sort of freakish, but still... "Um... I don't think I'm dead. I think I would know if I was dead. Anyway, why would Athena kill me?" I said. "She and I don't exactly see eye-to-eye, but... You don't remember anything?" He looked concerned now, a real fatherly expression. I just relaxed. "Nothing, I just woke up in Camp Half-Blood knowing my name was Max Flinton. Uh... You wouldn't know about that by any chance?" Poseidon shook his head. "No. You insulted Athena, and she made you explode. That's all I know about it."


End file.
